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Breville Sous Chef Peel & Dice review

This Breville Peel & Dicereview has been months in the making. Because like any complex, multipurpose appliance, I believe you have to use it in all kinds of real-life situations, put it through a few cleaning cycles and make a whole variety of things with it before writing about it.

One of Breville’s latest small home appliance achievements, the Sous Chef Peel & Dice is — at its heart — a food processor. But it’s a food processor on crack, with an ability to morph and do so much more than any food processor I’ve ever owned.

In fact, I’ll even admit that it competes with my beloved Vitamix on occasion — and that can be a tough act to follow.

The Breville Sous Chef Peel & Dice food processor in all its glory.

THE GOOD

The Breville Peel & Dice is HUGE. It can handle up to 16 ounces of whatever you’re chopping or mixing, which is a LOT and will probably prevent you from having to create two separate batches of anything like you may normally need to with average-sized food processors.

You will never be wanton for a blade or attachment to get the job done. There are more than I’ve ever had occasion to use in the four months I’ve spent with my personal Sous Chef!

And this is just the top layer…

It’s got a really wide chute at the top, which can be made smaller two more times with pieces that fit into one another. This means far less “prep-chopping” to get your big piece of food into smaller pieces just to fit it into the chute, as is often the case with other food processors.

Making several of my favourite recipes in the Peel & Dice is a snap. Hummus is much easier to produce in this food processor than in a blender, which is how I’ve always done it. And because this appliance comes with a “bowl” insert that lets you make a smaller amount of food more efficiently — 2.5 cups instead of the big bowl’s 16 cups, to be precise — it’s easy to make a small batch of anything. And with different blades available for different textures, you can decide whether you like your hummus smooth or a bit lumpy.

Using the small bowl insert, I was able to use the smallest can of chick peas to make hummus. (What else goes into my famous recipe? Garlic cloves, EVOO, tahini, cumin, smoked paprika, turmeric, sea salt, black pepper, freshly squeezed lime juice and a little bit of peanut butter).

I love that the Breville Peel & Dice comes with a scraper! One of the only things I really dislike about using my Vitamix is that it takes superhuman powers to get at all of the food that’s under the blades. Not so with the Peel & Dice! The spatula works wonders to scrape out every last bit of foodie goodness. My black bean brownies are so much better to mix together in the Sous Chef Peel & Dice, and the spatula means nothing is left at the bottom.

I also really enjoy making my own pizza dough now. Despite having a dough blade on my Kitchen-Aid stand mixer, it never really worked as well as I wanted. However, dough mixed in the Breville Peel & Dice comes out like an Italian dream!

This is how my pizza dough came out of the Sous Chef bowl!

The blade is designed to work with the gluten rather than cut it, so it’s stretchy and easy to throw. Baked on my pizza stone with a bit of extra-virgin olive oil, my whole family declared it the best crust ever.

Pancake and crepe batter is also a BREEZE with this bad boy, but if you’re planning to use oatmeal and mince it up into a flour-like texture, you’ll want to save that job for your blender if you’re finicky about every last oatmeal flake being pulverized.

Slicing potatoes? WOW. My husband swears he’ll never use his mandolin again. He said that he sliced enough potatoes to make two full 9×13 pan-fulls of scalloped potatoes in about a minute.

Super-sliced!

And making whipped cream was ridiculously easy, too. It was fast (about 30 seconds) and the cream took on a Cool-Whip kind of texture that I’ve never been able to achieve with my immersion blender.

There’s a timer and pulse option, which is great if you don’t want to just run the Breville Sous Chef to infinity and beyond.

There are only a couple of pieces of the Breville Sous Chef Peel & Dice processor that CAN’T go in the dishwasher. This is great, since I hate washing dishes by hand. Even better is that Breville noted which two pieces aren’t dishwasher safe right on the components themselves.

Like all of my other Breville appliances (which includes the Precision Brewer, an older-style coffeemaker, a steamer, the Smart Oven Air and the Juice Fountain Plus), the Peel & Dice is sturdy, high-quality and built to last. It even comes with a 25-year warranty on its induction motor.

Don’t ask me why I know that the blade/accessories bin is drop-resistant, but it is. (Hint: I’ll actually tell you how I found out in the gaffes.)

THE GAFFE

Peeling sweet potatoes with the peeling attachment worked OK, but trying to make them into French fries using that specialty attachment was a huge fail. It chopped them into little bits that looked nothing like fries. I ultimately had to puree them and make sweet potato pancakes instead.

Breville’s Peel & Dice is huge. It’s going to take up a lot of real estate on your counter — especially if you plan to keep the blades with the machine itself. I personally keep the set of blades in my pantry because I just don’t have the room on my countertop to house both components.

Speaking of that blade/accessories component, I really wish the bottom part was a drawer so you could slide it out rather than have to lift the top (which is heavy and awkward because it’s full of blades!) off to get at everything stored below. This is how I found out it’s drop-resistant…I actually assumed it was a drawer and didn’t lift the thing up properly when I went to move it from my kitchen island to my counter.

Here’s the bottom layer of blades — which I wish was a drawer.

It would also be ideal to have somewhere on one of the components, even on the bottom, to store the manual and loose recipe cards that come in the box.

I find the Peel & Dice fairly loud to operate. I mean, it’s a very powerful machine so I don’t expect something like that to be whisper-quiet, but it’s not something I let my kids’ and their little ears stand near when it’s running. By comparison, though, it’s NOT as loud as a Vitamix.

I have a lot of trouble getting a couple of the attachments back into their proper storage spot and then successfully closing the lid. I’m sure this is totally my own stupidity but it bears mentioning.

At around $550-700 depending on the retailer, Breville definitely has the Peel & Dice set at a premium price point. For the average at-home kitchenista, many of the attachments may collect dust and that’s really one of the big places where the price can be rationalized. So, if you’re a budding chef who’s really into experimentation and you think you’ll use this several times a week, it will ultimately prove to be a good investment.

THE GEARS

4/5

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So many great features, but I think I love the large size the best – I love to make large batches of things, and find myself wasting time having to break large sizes into smaller increments just to get the large job done. I sometimes wonder if I am really saving time when all is said and done. I also love that most of the parts are dishwasher safe, and that there is a scraper – 2 things that would also make life easier!

Oh, and what I would make first is hummus! My husband is on a big hummus kick right now, and my youngest daughter who is a picky eater is loving it too – on crackers and veggies which is a big bonus. A mom in the mom’s group I’m in recently posted about making homemade hummus and lots of people responded with different recipe options. I’ve never made my own hummus but would love to using this!

WOW!!! Very impressed!! The features on this are amazing!! It would save me so much time peeling potatoes! The first thing I would make is scalloped potatoes! It would take me half the time to make this with The Breville Peel & Dice. Mmmmm!!!

I make cauliflower pizza dough for my kids & this would save so much time with all of the attachments in one machine! To finely chop the cauliflower & then use the kneading function would be awesome. I also really appreciate that Breville thinks of the little things that matter like labeling the 2 parts that require hand washing!

I can not really pick. I love the potato slice part and the fact whipped cream takes 30 sec. I would make sliced potatos for my potato bake and whip meringue fro my homemade mile high lemon meringue pie

In the manual it says the only thing you SHOULDN’T use this machine for specifically is sweet potatoes or yams. They are too fibrous and that is why they don’t suggest using it. It may even void the warranty on the motor.

I would have made scalloped potatoes first thing. they are my favourite but I hate all the slicing. I had no idea there were so many attachments!! Wow truly can replace a lot of different appliances that sometimes barely get used. Amazing!

I’ve actsully never heard of this before reading your post. It sound pretty awesome. I think I’d like to try my hand at pizza crust, if I got good enough, I’d have some happy kiddos at home lol.. so many options!

What do I like best, the whole package, I like everything about it, I think the first thing I would make is bread or pizza, because your pizza picks are making me hungry. I would follow you on Twitter but I don’t do Twitter only facebook and rethinking that.

That slicer looks amazing! I am also very curious about the gaffe attachment. I have an older home and am so glad I turned my spare room into a pantry. The room is very close to my kitchen and is perfect for storing appliances that I can pull out on a whim!

I love that it slices and peels, and pretty much does all the grunt work for you! I would love to get one of these and use to to peel potatoes, slice them and make scalloped potatoes.. I’ve been craving them lately!

Roasted Pepper Soup with Pumpkin & Extra Aged Cheddar or Gouda. Oodles of peppers & an hour plus of chopping to prep. I could make it up and freeze small portions for lunches. Then the salsas & dips in large batches so it really would be a dream machine for Dad & the kids.

I love the potato peel and slicing! Goodbye mandolin! No more lost finger tips! What a great product! I think I would make cheesy scalloped potatoes first! So exciting, thank you! Good luck beautiful people!

OH gosh….how can ya like just one best?!! lol I do like the slicer for making scalloped potatoes. And I also like the dough maker for my pies and pizza too!! I’d probably do the slicer for the potatoes first.. This machine does it all for heavens sake!! love it!~ 🙂

It’s almost unbelievable how much this thing can do! I love making scalloped potatoes but I don’t often because of how much work it is to cut all the potatoes. I really like that it has a smaller bowl for making smaller amounts too because I’ve started making separate meals for myself as I don’t eat the same as my family a lot of the time.

Definitely the grating. I dont have a food processor atm and I find I’m always cutting myself or my fingernails when I try grating carrots, cheese, etc. I put my hubby on grating duty when I made Spanish rice for Easter supper. Lol I think I’d try the pizza dough first! Looks amazing!

I love that it can peel and slice potatoes. My husband loves scalloped potatoes but I hate peeling potatoes so I only make it once or twice a year. With this, I would make scalloped potatoes way more often!

There are so many great features that it is hard to pick one. I really like the case for the attachments and that the capacity of the bowl is large enough to make most recipes. Probably my favourite feature is the potato peeler function.

I like the peel option. I just made carrot and ginger soup, so wonder how it would do with carrots. I also like that it’s got a big capacity. I’m currently using my Kitchenaid chopper, which is rather petite.

I loved reading this review I am now convinced my kitchen needs one of these!! The feature you mentioned that I think I would use the most is the slicing option. We keep talking about making “cactus cut” potatoes but can never seem to get them sliced thin enough/it takes forever. I think that would be our first meal we would make if we had a Breville Sous Chef Peel & Dice.

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